Abby was in great trouble: indeed, she was the most agitated of the three, for it was with outward calm, at least, that De Arthenay spoke; and Marie listened quietly, too, plaiting her apron, between her fingers, and forgetting for the moment to make the horns with her left hand. Briefly, he asked her to be his wife; to come home with him, and keep his house, and share good and evil with him. He would take care of her, he said, and—and—he trusted the Lord would bless the union. If his voice shook now and then, if he kept his eyes lowered, that neither woman should see the light and the struggle in them, that was his own affair; he spoke quietly to the end, and then drew a long breath, feeling that he had come through better than he had expected.
Abby looked for an outburst of some kind from Marie, whether of tears or of sudden childish fear or anger; but neither came. Marie thanked Monsieur, and said he was very kind, very kind indeed. She would like to think about it a little, if they pleased; she would do all she could to please them, but she was very young, and she would like to take time, if Monsieur thought it not wrong: and so rising from her seat, she made a little courtesy, with her eyes still on the ground, and slipped away out of the room, and was gone.
The others sat looking at each other, neither ready to speak first. Finally Abby reflected that Jacques would not speak, at all unless she began, so she said, with a sigh between the words; "I guess it'll be all right, Jacques. It's only proper that she should have time to think it over, and she such a child. Not but what it's a great chance for her," she added hastily. "My! to get a good home, and a good provider, as I make no doubt you would be, after the life she's led, traipsin' here and there, and livin' with darkened heathens, or as bad. But—but—you'll be kind to her, won't you, Jacques? She—she's not a woman yet, in her feelin's, as you might say. She ain't nothin' but a baby to our girls about here, that's brought up to see with their eyes and talk with their mouths. You'll have patience with her, if her ways are a good deal different from what you were used to; along back in your mother's time?"
But here good Abby paused, for she saw that De Arthenay heard not a word of her well-meant discourse. He sat brooding in the corner, as was his wont, but with a light in his eyes and a color in his cheek that Abby had never seen before.
"Jacques De Arthenay, you are fairly possessed!" she said, in rather an awestruck voice, as he rose abruptly to bid her good-day. "I don't believe you can think of anything except that child."
"So more I can!" said the man, looking at her with bright, hard eyes. "Nothing else! She is my life!" and with that he turned hastily to the door and was gone.
"His life!" repeated Abby, gazing after him as he strode away down the street. "Much like his life she is, the pretty creetur! And she saying that fiddle was her life, only yesterday! How are all these lives going to work together? that's what I want to know!" And she shook her head, and went back to her spinning. There was no doubt in Abby's mind about Marie's answer, when she grew a little used to the new idea. Her silent suitor was many years older than she, it was true, but as she said to him, what a chance for the friendless wanderer! And if he loved her now, how much more he would love her when he came to know her well, and see all her pretty ways about the house, like a kitten or a bird. And she would respect and admire him, that was certain, Abby thought. He was a pictur' of a man, when he got his store clothes on, and nobody had ever had a word to say against him. He was no talker, but some thought that was no drawback in the married state. Abby remembered how Sister Lizzie's young husband had tormented her with foolish questions during the week he bad spent with them at the time of the marriage: a spruce young clerk from a city store, not knowing one end of a hoe from the other, and asking questions all the time, and not remembering anything you told him long enough for it to get inside his head; though there was room enough inside for consid'able many ideas, Abby thought. Yes, certainly, if so be one had to be portioned with a husband, the one that said least would be the least vexation in the end. So she was content, on the whole, and glad that Marie took it all so quietly and sensibly, and made no doubt the girl was turning it over in her mind, and making ready a real pretty answer for Jacques when he called the next day.
Yes, Marie was turning it over in her mind, but not just in the way her good hostess supposed. Only one thought came to her, but that thought filled her whole mind; she must get away,—away at once from this place, from the stern man with the evil eye, who wanted to take her and kill her slowly, that he might have the pleasure of seeing her die. Ah, she knew, Marie! had she not seen wicked people before? But she would not tell Abiroc, for it would only grieve her, and she would talk, talk, and Marie wanted no talking. She only wanted to get away, out into the open fields once more, where nobody would look at her or want to marry her, and where roads might be found leading away to golden cities, full of children who liked to hear play the violin, and who danced when one played it well.
Early next morning, while Abby was out milking the cows, Marie stole away. She put on her little blue gown again; ah! how old and faded it looked beside the fresh, pretty-prints that Abby would always have her wear! But it was her own, and when she had it on, and the old handkerchief tied under her chin once more, and Madame in her box, ready to go with her the world over, why, then she felt that she was Marie once more; that this had all been a mistake, this sojourn among the strange, kind people who spoke so loud and through such long noses; that now her life was to begin, as she had really meant it to begin when she ran away from Le Boss and his hateful tyranny.
Out she slipped, in the sweet, fresh morning. No-one saw her go, for the village was a busy place at all times, and at this early hour every man and woman was busy in barn or kitchen. At one house a child knocked at the window, a child for whom she had played and sung many times. He stood there in his little red nightgown, and nodded and laughed; and Marie nodded back, smiling, and wondered if he would ever run away, and ever know how good, how good it was, to be alone, with no one else in the world to say, "Do this!" or "Do that!" Just as she came out, the sun rose over the hill, and looking at the fiery ball Marie perceived that it danced in the sky. Yes, assuredly, so it was! There was the same wavering motion that she had seen on every fair Easter Day that she could remember. She thought how Mere Jeanne had first called her attention, to it, when she was little, little, just able to toddle, and had told her that the sun danced so on Easter Morning, for joy that the Good Lord had risen from the dead; and so it was a lesson for us all, and we must dance on Easter Day, if we never danced all the rest of the year. Ah, how they danced at home there in the village! But now, it was not Easter at all, and yet the sun danced; what should it mean? And it came to Marie's mind that perhaps the Good Lord had told it to dance, for a sign to her that all would go well, and that she was doing quite right to run away from persons with the evil eye. When you came to think of it, what was more probable? They always said, those girls in the village, that the saints did the things they asked them to do. When Barbe lost her gold earring, did not Saint Joseph find it for her, and tell her to look among the potato-parings that had been thrown out the day before? and there, sure enough, it was, and the pigs never touching it, because they had been told not to touch! Well, and if the saints could do that, it would be a pity indeed if the Good Lord could not make the sun dance when he felt like doing a kind thing for a poor girl.